Keep the hard disk from spinning up on resume/boot

[systemparadox]

Hi. I'm sure this will require a major BIOS rewrite or something, but here goes.

I'm thinking of running the main system (Linux of course, but probably irrelevant here) off a pcmcia memory card. Looks like the BIOS will boot from it with no problems, which is good.
If I do this, is it possible to stop hard disk (and dvd drive) from powering up (or at least spinning up) on resume from standby and on boot?

Why don't I want the hard disk to spin up?
If the main system is on a pcmcia card, it isn't needed. If I only want to do some simple task that doesn't require a storage medium as large as a HDD (say editing a todo list), then it would be a waste of time, battery power, and hard disk wear for it to spin up. Also, it's not necessarily going to be in a shock free state- I could be walking about or be in a car or something.

Thinking about it, it might not be too hard to do this (though the BIOS probably still needs editing). I recently bought an external usb hdd cable which came with an external power supply for 3.5"-5.25" devices. If I plug the power into a disconnected hard disk, it spins up. If I plug the power into a hard disk with the IDE cable plugged in, it doesn't spin up until I power on the rest of the system.

Maybe I can just stop the BIOS from issuing the spin-up command on boot/resume?

Any suggestions or comments would be much appreciated.
Thanks
Simon

[DIGITALgimpus]

Yup, that would require a BIOS rewrite. Perhaps even hardware modifications (IIRC a HD spins up when it gets power, not even a specific signal). That's pretty core functionality.